The introduction of videocassette recording devices (VCR) was one of the most important events in the history of television. Prior to the VCR people had little control over what they watch on their television. Prior to VCR's there was no such thing as video stores. Today VCR's are commonplace and are an integral part of the television watching activity. The VCR is merely a recording tool utilizing a blank cassette tape. In 1999, Digital Video Recorders (DVRs) hit the market providing television viewers recording capabilities far beyond the limits of the VCR. At the heart of the DVR system is a computer hard drive that stores television programs as digital files. Since the DVR internally stores digital files, the user is provided with more options with regard to the program recoding function and the program playback function.
In addition to the main content of a television program, many programs have a news ticker usually displayed at the bottom portion of the screen. The ticker provides up to date information about various news related items. The ticker event data is a continuous stream of text data embedded in the video stream and displayed on the lower portion of the television screen. Normally, ticker event data is used on popular news television stations such as CNN and ESPN. Currently the DVR records the television program and stores the ticker event data as part of the recording. At a later time, during the playback of the prior recorded video stream, the ticker event data is usually stale. As a result, the viewer has to watch tracker information that is already known and not of much use. Thus, what is needed is a method and system that displays the current ticker event data during the playback of the previously recorded video stream. This method and system should also have the capability of omitting a previously recorded stale ticker during the playback of the recorded stream.